Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday that there is an opportunity to reach a \u201chistoric peace agreement\u201d with Lebanon, following a shift in the balance of power since the war that began on October 7, 2023.\u00a0<\/p>\n
His remarks come as a 10-day ceasefire is set to take effect, aimed at advancing diplomatic efforts. US President Donald Trump earliers stated that he intends to invite both Israeli and Lebanese leaders to Washington to pursue the initiative.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have an opportunity to make a historic peace agreement with Lebanon,\u201d Netanyahu said, adding that recent developments led to direct contact from Lebanon seeking talks, which he noted had not occurred in more than four decades.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Breakdown of agreed-upon Lebanon-Israel ceasefire conditions published by the US State Department\u00a0<\/p>\n
According to Netanyahu, Israel agreed to a temporary ceasefire to facilitate negotiations that began with an ambassadors\u2019 meeting in Washington. He outlined two main objectives for the talks, stating, \u201cHezbollah will be disarmed\u201d and calling for \u201ca lasting peace agreement, peace through strength.\u201d<\/p>\n
The prime minister said Israel rejected conditions presented by Hezbollah ahead of the ceasefire, including a full Israeli withdrawal to the international border and a mutual \u201cquiet will beget quiet\u201d arrangement. \u201cI did not agree to either of these demands, and indeed, neither of these conditions is met,\u201d he said, adding that Israeli forces will remain in a security zone inside Lebanon.<\/p>\n
Netanyahu described the buffer zone as extending approximately 10 kilometers from the border, from the Mediterranean coast to the slopes of Mount Hermon near the Syrian frontier. He said the zone is intended to prevent ground incursions and anti-tank fire targeting Israeli communities, while acknowledging that Hezbollah still retains rocket capabilities that would need to be addressed in the framework of future agreements.<\/p>\n
Netanyahu: “I have agreed to a temporary ceasefire for 10 days to advance talks”<\/p>\n
He also referenced ongoing coordination with Washington on Iran, saying Trump is \u201cextremely determined to continue both the naval blockade and also to dismantle Iran’s nuclear capability.\u201d Netanyahu added that broader efforts to counter missile threats and enrichment capabilities are part of what he described as \u201ctwo very important moves\u201d that could reshape Israel\u2019s security environment in the coming years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday that there is an opportunity to reach a \u201chistoric peace agreement\u201d…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":395788,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[85,46,43],"class_list":{"0":"post-395787","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-israel","8":"tag-il","9":"tag-israel","10":"tag-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=395787"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395787\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/395788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=395787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=395787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=395787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}